Credit Balance Review
Less Than One-Third of Credit Balances Are Actual Refunds. The Rest Is Your Money.
The instinct when you see a credit balance is to assume you owe someone money. But the data tells a different story — the majority of credit balances come from posting errors, contractual misapplications, and processing mistakes that created a false credit. KeyMed researches every balance to determine what's a real refund, what's a correction, and what's revenue that belongs to you.
You're Probably Refunding Money You Don't Owe
The average hospital generates $2 million in new credit balances every year. At 1.5 accounts resolved per hour — the HFMA benchmark — a practice with 500 outstanding credits is looking at 330+ hours of staff time. And more than half of those credits aren't even real overpayments. They're posting errors that credited the wrong account. Contractual adjustments applied twice. Patient payments that duplicated an insurance payment that was later corrected. Refunding without research means sending checks for money you earned. Each credit requires investigation to determine the correct resolution — and “just refund it” is only correct about 30% of the time.
Individual Balance Research
We don't batch-process credit balances with a default action. Every credit is individually researched to determine the actual cause: posting error, duplicate payment, contractual overpayment, or patient overpayment. The resolution depends entirely on the cause.
Backlog Clearance and Ongoing Resolution
We clear your existing backlog while simultaneously handling new credits as they arise. Dedicated credit balance specialists work faster than the industry benchmark because they do this full-time, with the pattern recognition that comes from thousands of resolutions.
Prevention Through Root Cause Analysis
Every credit we resolve is categorized by cause. Over 50% come from posting errors. By improving posting accuracy and front-end processes upstream, we reduce the volume of new credits your practice generates quarter over quarter.
Compliant Refund Processing and Documentation
When a refund is genuinely owed, we process it in compliance with payer contracts and state regulations, with a complete audit trail: identification date, research findings, root cause, resolution action, and date of completion. Ready for any reviewer.
<1/3
Of Credit Balances Are Actual Refunds
The rest are corrections that return money to your bottom line.
50%+
Of Credits Come from Posting Errors
Errors that are corrected, not refunded.
$2M
New Credits Generated Per Year
The average that demands dedicated resources, not ad hoc attention.